


Redemption

by glacialphoenix



Series: Trial and Error (AU) [2]
Category: Final Fantasy IV
Genre: Alternate Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-09-04
Updated: 2011-09-04
Packaged: 2017-10-23 10:13:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 771
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/249175
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/glacialphoenix/pseuds/glacialphoenix
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kain finds that there are other roads to redemption.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Redemption

i.

Once, there were two knights: one sworn to the wind, the other to shadow.

She chose the other.

It is of these choices that stories are made.

 

ii.

They spar frequently: dragoon and dark knight, locked in graceful combat.

Sometimes – just sometimes – by _chance_ – he slips, and injures his friend.

It’s practice, Cecil says. Accidents happen.

He tells himself that, afterwards.

 

iii.

There are whispers that say: the King of Baron is not what he was.

Cecil carries out his duties with increasing reluctance; Kain with the stoicism of a man determined to keep his honour. Rosa, concerned white mage, flits between them, asking questions they refuse to answer.

 

iv.

The summon tears the earth asunder; he is knocked unconscious.

When he wakes, he is back in Baron, carried there by search parties; there is no news of Cecil and of the green-haired girl who survived the conflagration.

When he recovers, he insists on going to search for them.

The king is not pleased.

 

v.

He catches up to them eventually: the search is tiring, but Kain is persistent; he finds them in Mysidia, about to leave for Mount Ordeals.

 

vi.

He _should_ feel sorry for the paladin who never found his way to grace.

 

vii.

“What can you do about not being good enough?”

Kain looks at Rosa, curled fast asleep against Cecil, and makes no reply.

 

viii.

Cecil leaves for home, Rosa by his side; the dark sheen of his armour seems to consume the sunlight.

Kain watches them leave before he turns to make the lonely trek up Mount Ordeals.

 

ix.

Here, on the mountain, there is nothing but stone and the sound of the wind.

Kain climbs, nearly slips and falls a few times (and how appropriate that would be, he thinks, to join his friend in falling), but he makes it to the summit.

He pauses to catch his breath, and listens; he hears only silence.

 

x.

He sleeps on the summit, that night, and dreams: Rosa by his side, Cecil -

 _No!_

He wakes angry at himself: even in his sleep, he betrays his friends.

 

xi.

The Mysidians do not have an answer: the mountain has not accepted him, but it has not refused him, either. They have heard of no such thing.

They debate, then, long and fierce; Kain can hear some of the more vehemently-expressed opinions.

“He’s from Baron.”

“He is not responsible for the events that transpired.”

“But he is a friend of the one who is.”

Kain would like to defend Cecil - loyal, honourable, too damn generous Cecil; Cecil who wanted far too badly to make things right - but he keeps quiet, because he does not know what to say.

 

xii.

They send him on to Toroia in the end. The journey is long, but he likes the solitude: road and wind and sky, and no surge of jealousy.

 

xiii.

He has not been at Toroia very long when Cecil and Rosa find him. This does not surprise him; it is, after all, Cecil and Rosa, and he has never been able to hide from them, not since they were children playing hide-and-seek.

Cecil is tired and wan; Rosa not much better.

“Come home, Kain,” Cecil says. “Please.”

He agrees.

 

xiv.

He wonders how he could have missed it before: little notes of wrongness; all the things he should have noticed but did not. Cecil and Rosa’s faces are anxious and puzzled; they both turn towards him and wait expectantly.

Cecil, he thinks, was always the oblivious one.

But he has come home; he has already slipped back into the practised patterns of old: spear, sword and holy fire.

Everything is simple, after that; they tear Cagnazzo from the throne of Baron, and look at one another, wondering at their blindness.

Things are not right, not yet, but they will be.

 

xv.

The look of contentment on Cecil’s face is one he has not seen since his friend took up the dark sword. Kain feels a rush of relief at this: he was worried, always worried, even as he was jealous, but he has always found concern difficult to express.

So he only says, “I will have to leave again, soon.”

“I know,” Cecil says, and the smile on his face is warm and genuine. “Rosa and I will be ready by tomorrow morning.”

Kain is not surprised by this: Cecil and Rosa have always been able to read his unspoken requests.

 

xvi.

He has found peace, as Cecil has found contentment.

Kain wonders, briefly, if Mount Ordeals would respond differently, now --

 _No_ , he thinks. They no longer need it to.


End file.
